sometimes, i chance upon lost connections, the pictures, so unfocused and blurry from the sands of time, their clarity returns and i am struck by the distance. happy faces smiling at me, begging the question of only why i am not in those pictures. it is me, after all, a tendency to self destruct everything i hold dear, in a glaze of madness.

watched before sunrise yesterday, i remember the times, i walked down the streets in singapore, in oxford, in the middle of thenight talking about life, love, relationships to the ghosts in my past and how i felt that proximity, that intimacy that comes over when souls link. i broke away from FY not because i couldn't take her depression, not because I couldn't handle it. It is because our connection was lost as she descended deeper and deeper into it. Without that connection, i felt lost.

I look at my life now and i realised that I have nothing akin to that anymore. In severing my ties with my past, in my attempt to be functional, i have lost that part of my life.

I try not to twitch when I see human activity that does not involve me. I stare at the picture and i try to pretend that its just a picture, nothing more nothing less. I am a figure, standing there viewing a portrait of life but I am away from it as I am just a mere observer. I observe, I interpret but I do not interact. And it hurts. Sometimes. To feel that way, separate and alone. They say learn to ignore it, to see it as nothing, nothing that can affect you. But its hard. Its hard because at the end of it all, its just loneliness.

I can't stop thinking of lost chances, missed opportunities, the what ifs the what nots. I wish i can turn back time and put right the things that went wrong. I wish I can wake up today with her in my arms, I wish I didn't blow up the only chance I had for happiness. How can I write when I look, when I am aware that everything i think or do revolves around the same theme, that of lost love, that of death, that of the impossible. I am discontented with what I have. I know I have more than most. But somehow it just isn't enough and I know it will never be enough, because I lost my dream, and like the fleeting, it will never come back. I can only live with the emptiness, the monotony and the self awareness that its all gone.

Is liberation and self awareness, realising that I have the capacity to hurt someone advertently and not feel guilt about it? Is our conscience our Limiters as in Xenogears, the genetic code implanted in us, not to go against our creators, not to have the strength to match them, to have an uncontrollable fear of them, that we whimper at their feet? Guilt. It used to last longer. This time, it lasted for just half a day. The first ten minutes were the most intense but it slowly faded, while my Gears were tearing the Angels apart. The next day, I didn't feel a thing. What happened to my conscience? It used to be strong, it used to dictate my moods and my inactivity. Where has it gone to?

Am I free?

I have begun a systematic purge of people close to me, people who have seen beyond the facade, to the person within. These are the people that trigger my attacks, my depression. Or maybe more accurately, these are the people that I have an adverse reaction to. Self preservation? Perhaps. I don't wish to promise anyone that I will be with them, I will be there for them anymore. Because I realised that I am selfish after all, anyone who affects me and induces my attacks, I will sever my ties with them. It started with FY and now, its SL.

Its just you and M left now.

Feeling really fucked up. Why? I don't know, things are going well, academically, work is okie, panel review over without a glitch, supervisor meeting, fine, offered me a research assistant post with him, the thesis chapter, i think i know how I am going to write the current chapter. Feeling crappy because, sighs, because, I am not getting any interviews for the tutorship positions. Wondering whether its because I messed up the cover letter, or simply because of my race. ugh, i know everyone will be saying, be contented with what you have, blah blah, its just a minor setback, but, rationality has its limits, i just feel fucked up because of it and there's no explanation for it. Its just how it is and anyone giving me that kind of advice, can stuff a tree up his/her ass.

Feeling jumpy again. Why? Reason on the surface, thesis is moving slowly again, directionless, I don't know where the chapter is heading, to something mindblowing? Definitely not. To a simplistic exploration of explanations, there is that danger. I just don't know where I am going, and I am worried that it will not hit the standards, the impossible standards I have set for myself, i suspect, my superivisor will find it fine, but for me, its not enough, its never enough. Deeper reason: I am frightfully envious of the people around me, I mean, I honestly feel happy for them when they do well, but still, I am worried that, I am not as good as them, the way they write, their ideas, I just don't know whether I am good enough.